


Perigee

by BlueMinuet



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One)
Genre: Blood, Gore, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Medical Procedures, Mildly Dubious Consent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-11
Updated: 2018-08-11
Packaged: 2019-06-25 16:27:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15644556
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlueMinuet/pseuds/BlueMinuet
Summary: The DJD visit Pharma for medical care, but Tarn's treatment turns into a bit more than regular maintenance.Tarn flies off often, but Pharma always knows — like the tide — he’ll be back.





	Perigee

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DemonsDaughter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DemonsDaughter/gifts).



> Dear Giftee, I hope you enjoy this... I certainly did.

Tarn flies off often, but Pharma always knows — like the tide — he’ll be back.

Whether he comes back in one piece or not, that's a different story. Pharma’s seen each member of the DJD in every state of disrepair possible. He knows all the quirks of their frames, every strange aberration; the way Helex’s dentae tend to wobble, the way Vos tends to overextend himself and sprain his struts. He patches them all up, and they fly out, and like a moon swinging wildly around its planet, eventually they’ll return to perigee and the cycle begins again. 

Pharma feels all too comfortable strolling through the halls of the Peaceful Tyranny, falling in step to a tune he can’t quite hear yet, but he knows it’s there. The first person he comes across is Kaon, and he can’t help but scowl a bit. He likes Kaon well enough — secretly, he sometimes thinks that Kaon is among the most reasonable in the group — but his ever present pet makes Pharma’s fields bristle. The pet looks up at him, tongue rolling out of its mouth, and flashing eyes that seem slightly pained, and Pharma makes no attempt to hide his disgust. 

To his credit, Kaon doesn’t comment on it. 

“How did it go?” Pharma asks. He doesn’t know where they’ve been or what they’ve done (outside of the obvious) but it seems like the thing to say. 

Kaon shrugs, scratching behind his so-called-sparkeater’s ears. “Same old, same old. You know how it is.”

Pharma almost wishes he didn’t. Almost. “And Tarn?”

“Same old, same old,” Kaon says again. 

In the next room, the tune that had been stuck in Pharma’s head starts playing in earnest. 

“Seems your patient will see you now,” Kaon says. 

Pharma makes a show of annoyance, but in the end he knows that’s all it is. They’re all just putting on a show.  
  


* * *

  
Pharma’s not sure why he keeps going back. It’s not the threat of death, not anymore; though privately, he wonders if it ever really was. Maybe it’s because Delphi is cold and desolate. Maybe it’s because he’s bored. 

Maybe it’s because having his arms buried halfway into the torso of one of the most dangerous Decepticons alive is the only thing that makes him feel alive anymore. 

“Nearly got it.” One of his fingers nearly lose purchase within the slick torso, the misshapen shambles of the tcog fighting against him as he struggles to dislodge it. Half of him wants to grab a chainsaw and be done with it. 

Then again, some tasks are too nice to rush. 

“My my, are you losing your touch, dear doctor?” 

Pharma grins, pulling tighter on the tcog. If it won’t spring free, at the very least he can use it to pull himself closer. “Have some faith in me,” he says, half leaning over his patient now. He braces a pede on the medical berth to give a harder jerk. The patient flinches, but Pharma pays it no mind. 

Most patients would have chosen to be completely unconscious for this. 

Most patients are not Tarn. 

Despite the flinch, Pharma doesn’t miss the hint of a smile peeking from behind the mask. “If I didn’t know better, doctor, I’d say you’re milking this.” 

“Perish the thought,” Pharma says. “This one is particularly grisly. Have you been avoiding me?” 

“Perish the thought,” Tarn parrots back to him. “I’ve been busy.” 

Pharma pulls out one hand, pressing it just above Tarn’s abdomen. He can feel Tarn’s energon pump beating, hardly even impacted by the sedative, still following along with the tune playing around them, slightly tinny as the sound bounces off the stark, metallic operating theater. Pharma’s hand leaves smatters of energon across Tarn’s plating as he braces himself, but if Tarn notices, he doesn’t care. Then again, he may have not felt it. He’s got just enough sedative in him to take the edge off; not enough to knock him out, not enough to stop him from defending himself should the need arise. 

His reflexes are still impacted though. Pharma has thought many times about how much he could get away with while Tarn is in this state. How many parts he could rip out before the Decepticon even noticed, reduce him to a pile of scrap, spill him out piece by piece onto the operating theater floor. 

He doesn’t. He never considers it really, not seriously. But the idea that he could, the curiosity of how far he’d get before Tarn gathered enough of his faculties together to kill him…

It gives him a thrill nothing else ever has. 

Pharma slings a leg over him, straddling his patient now, bracing against both sides of the berth to give him leverage. If Tarn minds the near intimate close-quarters, he says nothing. The tcog finally comes out with a sick crunch and the sound of metal scraping roughly against itself. The thing half disintegrates in Pharma’s hands. As a general rule, Pharma doesn’t go about just throwing organs anywhere, but in this case he can’t help but make an exception, dropping the twisted husk on the floor. He sighs, resting his other, now-free, hand on Tarn’s chest as well, resting a moment, nearly draping himself over the still open incision site. 

“You certainly like giving me a challenge.” 

“I think you’d go mad if I didn’t,” Tarn replies, and the rumble of his vocalizer reverberates up Pharma’s arms. 

Pharma huffs at that. “If this is what sanity is like…” He leans over, fishing for the replacement tcog on the table next to them. 

“Well…” Tarn says, his voice portraying a feigned retreat, one neither of them would ever believe. “At the very least you aren’t bored.” 

Pharma considers that a moment. He sits up, resting his weight on Tarn’s thighs, spinning the new tcog in his hands. It’s shiny, nearly new; one of his best salvages, in Pharma’s opinion. 

Again, he wonders if this is just an exercise in staving off boredom. But all things said and done, perhaps it doesn’t matter. Boredom, loneliness, a maladaptive coping mechanism. 

It all comes to the same ends. 

An urge comes over Pharma, and this time he doesn’t fight it, doesn’t bother mulling it over in his head. It’s a bad idea, but he’ll do it all the same. 

He bend over towards the head of the medical berth, and before Tarn can say anything, before he can coax his numbed limbs to move, Pharma flicks his mask off. 

Tarn makes a noise of protest, but Pharma already has a hand over his face, smearing the soft metal with blood. 

“Doctor…” The voice is a low growl, and something primal in Pharma quivers in fear. Many have heard that tone from Tarn.

Most never survive it. 

In the end, that’s the heart of it. Pharma can have his hands buried as deeply inside of Tarn as he wishes. But as long as he can still speak, still think, Pharma will never have the upper hand. 

Maybe that’s the reason Pharma keeps ending up here. 

Maybe it’s not that Tarn keeps coming back like the tide. Maybe it’s just that Pharma is like an insect drawn to flame. 

He swipes a finger over Tarn’s lips, and he’s nearly surprised when Tarn bites at it. More surprised that he doesn’t bite it off. Tarn seems to hold the digit for a moment, considering before making his next move. In the end, he licks it, languidly cleaning his own still-warm energon off the digit. 

Pharma sets the tcog by Tarn’s head, freeing up his hand to explore the crevices of his neck. 

Tarn lets go of his finger, looking up at his doctor with a requisite glare. “I’m not a mech that suffers useless delays lightly, my dear doctor.”

“Do you see this as a waste of time?”

“That would seem to depend on you,” Tarn says. 

Pharma grins, running his fingers along Tarn’s face once more, leaving broad swipes of energon smeared across it as he caresses. “I suppose I’ll have to make it worth your while then.” 

Before Tarn can reply, Pharma digs the kibble of his knee into Tarn’s side, just under the incision. Tarn groans, a breathy noise that — if Pharma’s audials don’t deceive him — turn the slightest bit needy as Pharma slowly but sure amps up the pain. 

“I do always—” Tarn’s voice falters with another breathy moan. “—enjoy your work, Doctor.”

Pharma’s grip tightens as he smiles.  
  


* * *

  
Pharma wrings his hands together as he treks through the snow over Delphi. His fingers are clean now, but part of him can’t shake the vision of them smeared with energon, and he allows himself a gentle smile at the thought. 

Above him, The Peaceful Tyranny roars through the air behind him, swift engines setting it on a course to break free from gravity. Off to the next box to tick, the next name on the list. 

But Pharma smiles, knowingly. 

Pharma walks away from Tarn often, but they both know — like tides, like moths to flame, like moons dancing in a delicate orbit — he’ll be back.


End file.
